1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process for the preparation of a hard candy which contains an enzyme and more particularly, to a hard candy, in which the enzyme is uniformly dispersed therein and which is excellent in mouth feel.
2. Related Art
An enzymatic preparation in the form of a tablet, powder, capsule or the like may be given to a person who often experiences bradypepsia (i.e., slow digestion) due to a remarkable reduced ability to masticate food or who has a constitutional predisposition to ozostomy (i.e., bad breath) due to a food residue left in the mouth. In order to simplify the administration or intake of the enzyme, a hard candy containing the enzyme has been developed, in lieu of the drug type preparations.
In general, the hard candy containing the enzyme has been prepared by preparing a usual candy mass with use of mainly saccharide materials such as sucrose, corn syrup and the like. The candy mass is then crushed to prepare granules, and the granules are mixed with an enzyme, and the mixture is press shaped into a desired form.
This conventional process has a disadvantage that the saccharide material exists in the form of granule in the resulting candy product to give a rough mouth feel which is quite different from a usual hard candy product to be prepared through a melting and solidifying steps.
Therefore, another process, wherein the enzyme is added directly to the saccharide material, has been proposed. However, this process has a disadvantage that the enzyme may be inactivated by a thermal denaturation in the step for concentrating the saccharide material containing solution into a candy base.